


Summertime

by GoodGollyMissYollie (Yollie183)



Series: Danger Days [2]
Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Angst, Blood, Gang Violence, M/M, Vigilantism, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-24
Updated: 2015-03-24
Packaged: 2018-03-19 11:07:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3607863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yollie183/pseuds/GoodGollyMissYollie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan and Phil meet in the summer of Dan's seventeenth year. </p><p>In 1945 when America dropped the nuclear missiles on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, no one expected Japan to retaliate. And yet they did, joining forces with the Soviet Union to unleash a nuclear war that nearly destroyed the planet. Now only a few countries remain, struggling for survival under toxic skies, ruled by greedy corporations.<br/>The British National Corporation has seized control of England and Wales. London has become the playground for five crime families. In this cold dystopian city, two ordinary young men rise up to fight against injustice as masked vigilantes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Summertime

**Author's Note:**

> Title and lyrics from Summertime by My Chemical Romance.
> 
> Each fic in this series can be read on its own, but they do form part of a greater narrative eventually, so please read the other parts too, maybe?

Dan met Phil on a rainy day, as he was walking home from school. A lanky young man with ruffled black hair and eyes on the ground that suddenly walked into Dan, causing him to lose his balance.

“Oh! I’m so sorry!”

“It’s okay,” Dan mumbled, looking up into blue eyes before gathering his books and getting to his feet.

“I really am sorry,” the young man said again, his fingers tugging nervously at the zipper of his jacket.

Dan attempted a smile, ignoring the twinge of pain from his hip as he straightened up. It was going to bruise, he was sure.

“It really is okay,” he repeated. “It’s not like you did it on purpose.”

“No! Of course not, I’d never!”

Dan smiled a little wider, adjusting his books in his arms.

“I’m Dan,” he said, not sure why.

“Phil,” the man held out his hand and Dan shook it.

 

They formed an unlikely friendship. Awkward, quiet Dan and quirky, bubbly Phil. Not even the four year age gap seemed to matter too much as they spent more and more time together week after week. Most days after school, Dan would go to the coffee shop where Phil worked, doing his homework over coffee while waiting for Phil’s shift to end so they could go to Phil’s apartment or Dan’s parent’s house to watch movies or have long talks about any- and everything.

 

 _When the lights go out_  
_Will you take me with you_  
_And carry all this broken bone_  
_Through six years down in crowded rooms_  
_And highways I call home?_  
_Something I can't know 'til now._  
_'Til you pick me off the ground_  
_With a brick in hand, your lip-gloss smile,_  
_Your scraped-up knees._  
  
On a lovely summer evening, Phil found himself staring at Dan as they walked to his house. Dan was telling Phil about a project he had for English, his hands moving in fluid gestures as he quoted Shakespeare. Phil hitched the strap of his overnight bag higher on his shoulder, to keep from grabbing Dan’s hand to hold it still and feel it’s warmth. Phil shook the thought from his head. He was much to old for Dan, he knew.

They turned the corner of the street where Dan lived and stopped in their tracks.

Two police cars were parked outside a house, along with an unmarked white van. Splashes of red and green from the police vehicles’ lights painted the sides of the van.

“Dan,” Phil said slowly. “Dan, isn’t that...”

Suddenly, Dan took off running, past the other houses toward his. Phil followed, catching up just as Dan stopped beside the white van.

“It’s a corpse carrier.” Dan’s voice was hollow as he murmured the colloquial name for the vehicle from the Corporation Mortuary.

Phil followed half a step behind Dan as he walked around it, toward the driveway. Two policemen stopped them.

“This is my house,” Dan said, his voice breaking.

The policemen looked at each other, then at Phil.

“Do you live here too?” One of them asked him.

Phil shook his head. “No, I’m Dan’s friend.”

“Dan?” The other policeman asked and Dan nodded. “Oh. Well, Dan, I am really sorry to tell you this, but it seems that there has been a burglary. Your parents and brother were killed.”

Dan’s eyes moved from the policeman’s face to the house.

“I don’t understand,” he said. His lower lip was trembling and he bit down on it.

Phil did understand though. Whenever people were killed by gangs under police protection, it was called a burglary. It was the same in every city in the country. Some cities had vast networks of crime families, others had smaller gangs, like Wokingham.

“Was it an initiation?” Dan asked the policeman suddenly, proving that he understood all too well. The policeman nodded uncomfortably.

“Which gang?” Dan asked. “The Dead Spiders? They kill families. Or the Blues?”

The policemen both shook their heads, saying they didn’t know.

Dan took a few more steps toward the house, stopping when the front door opened. It happened slowly, two men exited the house, carrying a body bag between them, then two more, with another body bag. The final two were carrying a bag that was much smaller than the others.

Dan’s legs gave out and he sank to his knees on the grass, watching the macabre procession toward the Corporation Mortuary van.

Phil stepped up next to Dan, resting one hand lightly on his friend’s trembling shoulder. It took only minutes for them to load the bodies into the van. Dan kept staring up at the house until the police vehicles were gone and the street was no longer bathed in the green and red glow of their lights. Finally, Dan reached up, placing his cold fingers over Phil’s.

“Dan,” Phil said gently. “Let’s go. We can stay at my place tonight.”

Dan didn’t move. Phil bit his lip, wavering for a moment, then reached down, sliding one arm around Dan’s chest.

“Dan,” he murmured. “C’mon. Please get up.”

Dan let Phil help him to his feet, leaning heavily on the older boy. He kept looking back over his shoulder as his feet and Phil carried him forward and away.

 

_And if you stay I would even wait all night_  
_Or until my heart explodes._  
_How long?_  
_'Til we find our way in the dark and out of harm_  
_You can run away with me anytime you want_

 

Once inside Phil’s apartment, with the door locked, Dan let out a scream of agony. Phil let him rage and throw ornaments and pillows. He let Dan scream at him, hit the walls until he left red stains across the white surface. Eventually Dan’s energy burned away and he collapsed on the floor. His sobs were broken, painful to listen to, but Phil sat down next to him, rubbing warm circles across his back and shoulders. Later, he helped Dan to the bedroom, tugging off his shoes before pulling his own blue and green blanket over him. Phil didn’t sleep. Instead, he sat cross legged at the foot of his bed, doodling sad faces across a notebook. Twice during the night, Dan woke up, once out of thirst and once from a nightmare. Both times Phil helped where he could and felt horrible that he could do nothing to soothe Dan’s anguish or bring back his family. A few times Phil heard Dan mumble his brother’s name in his sleep.

 

 _Terrified of what I'd be_  
_As a kid from what I've seen_  
_Every single day when people try_  
_And put the pieces back together_  
_Just to smash them down_  
_Turn my headphones up real loud_  
_I don't think I need them now_  
_'Cause you stopped the noise._  
  


The day of the funeral was unseasonably cold, with a light drizzle of rain falling incessantly to earth.

Dan dragged himself out of Phil’s bed not long after dawn. Phil watched him stumble through the door to the bathroom, feeling cold with the sudden loss of Dan’s body heat. He sighed and rubbed his eyes, not at all ready to face the day. For the past two weeks Dan and Phil had hidden in Phil’s apartment, letting Dan’s grandparents make arrangements for the funeral and after. Dan’s summer holidays had started and Phil took off from work, knowing that Dan shouldn’t be left alone. On the rare occasions when the younger boy had spoken more than a handful of syllables, the anger in his voice, in the half-formed ideas he had said aloud, scared Phil. He wasn’t sure that Dan wasn’t reckless enough to try and avenge his family.

 

_And if you stay I would even wait all night_  
_Or until my heart explodes._  
_How long?_  
_'Til we find our way in the dark and out of harm_  
_You can run away with me anytime you want_

As the sun started to set, the rain falling heavier and colder by the minute, Dan and Phil stood alone next to a crumbling mausoleum, facing three new graves that they could barely see through the downpour. Dan had kept his headphones on all through the wake, a barely-there piano melody just audible, but now he tugged them off.

“Phil,” he said quietly, tilting his face up into the rain. “I’m leaving. Tomorrow.”

Phil was following the path of a raindrop as it slid slowly down Dan’s neck.

“Where?”  he asked.

“London,” Dan answered.

“Okay.”

Dan lowered his chin, looking at Phil, his dark eyes clear.

“Come with me?”

“Okay.”

 

London seemed like a different life to Dan. He tried his best to leave Wokingham and all it’s memories behind. Phil was his family now, their apartment close to the Thames was his home. They got good jobs at the London City Radio Station, which was leagues more casual than the Corporation owned British National Broadcasting Network Radio (BNBN Radio).

They even made friends: Louise with a warm smile to match her personality, Chris, who was never serious and PJ, intense and creative.

For months, Dan was as happy as he could imagine himself being. If sometimes the darkness got to him and he crawled into Phil’s bed at 2am, who did it hurt? Phil could make the nightmares go away, better than alcohol or pills and that was all that mattered, Dan thought.

For the most part, Dan ignored the system of five crime families that ruled London. They were not that different from the gangs that had run rampant in Wokingham.

 

“Dan, come on, hurry up!” Phil called from the lounge. They were going to dinner with their friends, and Dan knew Phil hated being late.

“I’m done!” Dan shouted, tugging on a shoe while struggling to push his arm through the sleeve of his jumper. He ran down and nearly fell down the stairs, barely managing to grab Phil around the neck as the older boy was coming up to see what was taking so long.

“Sorry, Phil!” Dan breathed, finding his feet one step above the stair on which Phil was standing with an exasperated grin on his face.

“It’s okay,” Phil said with a roll of his eyes.

Dan’s arms were still around Phil’s neck and one of Phil’s hands rested on his waist, the other braced against the wall.

Without thinking, Dan leaned down, brushing his lips across Phil’s cheek in a swift kiss. “Thanks for saving me,” he murmured, then disentangled himself from Phil and jumped the last few stairs. He was at the door, already buttoning up his coat by the time Phil reached him. The older boy’s cheeks were a vivid pink.

They arrived at the restaurant to cheerful greetings.

“Tell them the joke!” Louise said to Chris, accidently hitting PJ on the arm as she motioned wildly.

“Okay,” Chris said, leaning forward, one arm slung across PJ’s shoulders. “So there’s this guy, who works at a bank and one day he–“

Chris’ sentence was cut off by a gun shot, loud and terrifying. Dan twisted in his seat, his eyes widening at the scene that had unfolded in the centre of the crowded restaurant.

Two small groups of people were facing off against each other, guns drawn like a scene from a play. One group wore the colours of the Arsen family, the other group had armbands with the Sloane family’s logo. Dan didn’t hear the words they shouted, could only fully focus on Phil’s hand gripping his arm. More shots were fired, people screamed, cried. Dan heard PJ’s voice, but not his words. He gripped Louise’s shoulder, pulling her down, to the ground, like Phil was pulling him.

It was over too quickly. Dan felt Louise’s body go limp, then warm blood spilling over his chest and legs, where her head was resting. He was vaguely aware of PJ sobbing, “Chris, no, oh god, _Chris...”_

“Dan!” A different voice yelled in his ear.

He turned his head. Phil was staring at him, tears shimmering in his blue eyes.

“Are you hurt?” he asked and Phil shook his head.

The ambulances came, followed by white Corporation Mortuary vehicles. Louise and Chris were taken away.

_Well, anytime you want_  
  
_Don't walk away_  
  
_'Cause if you stay I would even wait all night_  
_Or until my heart explodes._  
_How long?_  
_Until we find our way in the dark and out of harm._  
_You can run away with me_  
_You can write it on your arm_  
_You can run away with me anytime you want_

 

PJ left London after the funeral, to stay with his parents for a while.

When they got back to their apartment, Phil collapsed onto the sofa, burying his face in his hands, his elbows resting hard on his knees.

“It has to stop,” Dan said suddenly into the quiet. “All this violence, all this murder. It has to end. Someone has to end it.”

Phil looked up. Dan’s eyes were shining, his face set into hard lines.

“It’s the way things are, Dan,” Phil said quietly.

“Oh, is that so?”

“Dan,” Phil wasn’t sure what to say next.

“You can sit here, enjoying your illusion of comfort,” Dan sneered. “But I intend to do the right thing.”

“And what is that, exactly?”

“Fight.” Dan said. “Like that guy in the news.”

“You mean the madman that put on a mask and pretended to be a hero?”

“He saved people! Phil, he saved four lives,” Dan knelt on the floor in front of Phil, gripping the older boy’s forearms. “If I can save just five, maybe it’ll be worth dying, like he did.”

“Dan,” Phil tried to speak as gently as he could. “I know what you’re thinking. It won’t bring them back. They’re gone. This idea that you have – it’s suicide. I’ve already lost too many people, I refuse to lose you too.”

“Then come with me. We can do this together.”

Phil shook his head and got to his feet. He paused at the foot of the stairs.

“I know you’re hurting, Dan,” he said quietly. “And I really am trying to make it better for you.”

He continued up the stairs without waiting for a reply and lay awake for hours, listening to Dan rummaging around in his room.

 

For the following weeks, they barely spoke. Every time the news reported violent deaths, Dan would glance at Phil with resentment in his dark eyes. But Phil had already lost too many friends, in Manchester and now in London. He knew losing Dan would destroy him.

Even so, when Dan came home a month later with motorcycle leathers and enamelled masks, he nodded and pulled the lion’s face on over his own.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!  
> If anything is unclear, please let me know. There are some aspects of the universe which I may skip over accidentally, so please tell me if something doesn't make sense!


End file.
